The Haunted Soul (Zant X Reader)

_ Prologue _

Orodon village, I've grown up here all my life. I live with my father, our mayor and my younger sister Ilia. The days are peaceful and fun. I tag along with the rest of the children to play and enjoy all this place has to offer. Although, I'm not a child anymore. I turned 19 a few weeks ago, but I don't have any duties to this town yet. I sat on the porch watching everyone bicker and laugh with one another. The newest of our group was Link. He had come over a year ago, and was just a bit younger than me. I could see how much Ilia adored him, and I agreed with her. He was strong, brave and kind to everyone around him.

"(Y/n)," My attention snapped up towards my father who had opened the door. "May I speak with you for a moment?" He asked. I smiled and hoisted myself up, following him inside. "What is it?" I asked as soon as the door had closed. "Let's talk about your future." He said softly and gestured me to sit. I took the invitation and pulled a chair, he sat across from me. "I know you love it in this town, but what would you like to do? All of your options aren't feasible to make a decent living, or require you to leave." I opened my mouth to comment as my father continued on. "I am also the mayor of this town. It is my job to contribute to the town and it's well-being. I would love to help you in any way, but I cannot. You need to know the next steps for your future." I blinked and sat back in thought.

"Father, there's nothing that motivates me more than owning a library for myself and others. I love reading, I love books and how they feel. I would love for others to know the same comfort I know."
"That's the issue (Y/n), you'd need quite a bit of money that we don't have." He said softly, and trailed off into thought. I gave an exasperated sigh. We've already had this conversation many times before, and each time it gets more frustrating than the last.

"Maybe, you should think about marrying someone with a decent amount of money." Father spoke, breaking the silence. My head snapped towards him, my face evident of my distaste. "Absolutely not, there's no way—"
"There's been a few young men looking for wives and asking me about you, (Y/n)." I stood from the table, red in the face. "If you think I'm just going to marry someone I don't even know to get out of your hair, you're insane! I'll pack up and leave on my own." I snapped. "I would never marry someone without seeing them first, that is such an old fashioned thing to do! It's disgusting, and I thought we were away of that in this town." I said and stormed out of the house. I slammed the door behind me, thankful that everyone else had ran off somewhere.

Tears welled up in my eyes as I began to quickly match to the Orodon Spring. I allowed myself to start crying as soon as my feet met the sandy bank, and I sat down in the furthest corner to avoid being seen by passerby's. I sat crying, trying to make a plan. I needed to leave before my father became serious about his threats of marrying me off to someone. I wiped away my tears and stood. "(Y/n)! There you are." I heard Ilia's voice breathe a sigh of relief. She rushed over to me and caught me in a hug. I gave her a squeeze back. "Talo and Mail ran off into the woods! Link just went after them and I couldn't find you." She said and pulled back looking at my face.

"Wait, why were you crying?" I quickly wiped the last of my tears away. "Well, father threatened to marry me off so I can actually do something with myself." I explained. Ilia scoffed. "Are you kidding me? That's absurd." I nodded and rolled my eyes. "Yeah, so I was thinking of just... leaving." I said slowly. Ilia's face dropped. "What? Leaving? But (Y/n), you're my sister." I shook my head at her. "It's something we should talk about later. Link, where is he? Should we go help?" I asked, distracting her for the moment.

Ilia glared at me, knowing what I was doing. She obliged and shook her head. "I think we should let Link do it, but let's go tell father or Rusl. They'll know what to do more than us." I nodded in agreement. "Yes, that sounds like a good plan. I can inform Rusl and you can tell father." We began our jog back to the village, splitting ways. I rushed to the old swordsman's house, informing him of what occurred.

A couple hours later, Link returned. He had the two boys with him and a relieved expression on his face. Ilia ran to meet him, the two young boys got scolded by their parents. I watched, glad everyone was safe.

The ease I felt within myself was one I would soon forget.